Entries tagged with: AtomsforPeace

The Monday after Thanksgiving Weekend is looking to be Official Year-End List Day, as we've already got SPIN, and Paste, (plus ones from UK mags Q and Mojo) and now here's the one from elder rock statesman Rolling Stone, who have Vampire Weekend's Modern Vampires of the City in the top spot, with Kanye West's Yeezus at #2. RS' Top 10 also makes room for John Fogerty, Paul McCartney, Lorde and more. Haim are at #31 for those keeping score. You can check out their entire Top 50 LPs of 2013 list (which includes a couple EPs) below...

Giraffage kicked things off at noon during Saturday's stretch of the festival after an introduction from Noise Pop/Salty Artist Management's Chad Heimann aka Chad Salty, performing sample-driven dance music for the early crowd. Giraffage's two-girl "skate squad" roller skated around the stage, waving an American flag as Charlie dropped the bass-heavy banger "Money", leading into his remix of "Party in the USA".

Antwon cranked up the bass on the Tunnel Stage with local producer Nanosaur and rapper Sad Andy backing his punk-inspired rap songs. The Nature Boy gang performed fan favorites such as "Dark Denim", "Helicopter", and "Living Every Dream". Sad Andy did not perform "Ferragamo", despite audience requests. However, Antwon did stop the beats to lead the crowd in a singalong of "I Want It That Way" by the Backstreet Boys.

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Holy Ghost! performed a fun set of colorful dance rock, followed by Little Dragon on the Bridge Stage. Phantogram drew an impressive crowd to Saturday's final set on the Tunnel Stage, with the duo debuting danceable new material despite a few harsh feedback issues. Fireworks went off across the bay as the band performed. Atoms For Peace closed out the evening with a hooded Flea, and Thom Yorke singing tracks from AMOK while busting out his unique dance moves. [The Bay Bridged]

While CMJ was going down in NYC, across the country in San Francisco, the annual two-day Treasure Island Music Festival (10/19-20) returned. The first day had a mostly electronic-oriented lineup, featuring sets from Atoms for Peace, Major Lazer, Little Dragon, Phantogram, Disclosure, Danny Brown and more. Pictures from that day are in this post, and a set of day 2 pics is on the way.

As you may have heard today's final day of Austin's ACL Fest's weekend 2 (10/13) was canceled due to flooding. Venues scrambled to book bands elsewhere and Atoms for Peace (who were to have headlined the Lady Bird stage tonight) landed at ACL Live / Moody Theatre. ACL will be streaming their performance live tonight at 10 PM CDT (11 PM Eastern). Watch it here.

Atoms for Peace played last Sunday (10/6) at weekend 1 of ACL and we already published a set of that and other W1D3 pics. A second set of Atoms for Peace pics from last weekend are in this post. You can check out pics of Weekend 2, Day 1 here and look for pics of the second day of ACL Weekend 2 soon. More of those Atoms for Peace pics below.

Thom Yorke is well known for his general dissatisfaction with music industry pay models at this point. Radiohead helped affect a sea change in the music industry by becoming early adopters of the pay-what-you-want online sales model. Since then, Yorke and Radiohead producer/Atoms For Peace collaborator Nigel Godrich have become outspoken critics of the pay models built into online streaming services, and of Spotify in particular.

Yorke and Godrich also argued that Spotify is essentially set up to benefit its shareholders, rather than the artists whose music it offers to its users, and that the service colludes with major labels in an effort to wring more profits out of their classics-rich catalogues.

The debate petered out for a while, but picked up again last week when Yorke gave an interview to the Mexican culture site Sopitas, in which he again disputed Spotify's sustainability in response to a question about the future of mainstream music. Yorke offered a particularly memorable analogy at the end of his response. Here's the whole thing:

"I feel like the way people are listening to music is going through this big transition. I feel like as musicians we need to fight the Spotify thing. I feel that in some ways what's happening in the mainstream is the last gasp of the old industry. Once that does finally die, which it will, something else will happen. But it's all about how we change the way we listen to music, it's all about what happens next in terms of technology, in terms of how people talk to each other about music, and a lot of it could be really fucking bad. I don't subscribe to the whole thing that a lot of people do within the music industry that's 'well this is all we've got left. we'll just have to do this.' I just don't agree.

When we did the In Rainbows thing what was most exciting was the idea you could have a direct connection between you as a musician and your audience. You cut all of it out, it's just that and that. And then all these fuckers get in the way, like Spotify suddenly trying to become the gatekeepers to the whole process. We don't need you to do it. No artist needs you to do it. We can build the shit ourselves, so fuck off. But because they're using old music, because they're using the majors... the majors are all over it because they see a way of re-selling all their old stuff for free, make a fortune, and not die. That's why to me, Spotify the whole thing, is such a massive battle, because it's about the future of all music. It's about whether we believe there's a future in music, same with the film industry, same with books.

To me this isn't the mainstream, this is is like the last fart, the last desperate fart of a dying corpse. What happens next is the important part."

You can listen to the whole interview with Yorke below. Spotify turns five years old today; if you want to celebrate, you'll have to choose someone else's music to stream from its archives.

Going by evidence presented all weekend at ACL Fest, of all the bands of their generation, Franz Ferdinand might be the only ones with a sense of humor.

You can see it in the deliberately cartoonish oversized guitar amps with huge dials, knobs, and red lights erected in front of their actual backline. You can hear it as they morph one of their songs into Donna Summer's "I Feel Love."

The Glaswegian New Wave revivalists prove a master class in taut, muscular rock & roll and how to engage and entertain even the largest audience. - [Austin Chronicle]

The first weekend of the 2013 ACL Music Festival wrapped up on Sunday (10/6) with another big day of bands, including Phoenix, Atoms for Peace, The National, Tame Impala, Divine Fits, Franz Ferdinand, Toro Y Moi, Dawes, pop superstar Lionel Richie and lots more. Pictures from those bands and other Sunday performers are in this post.

ACL will do it all again -- almost identically -- this coming weekend (October 11 - 13). Many of the bands will be sticking around Texas in between to play official ACL Late Night shows which happen not just in Austin, but Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio too.

Divine Fits will be in NYC this weekend for the CBGB Festival, playing the big free Times Square show on Saturday afternoon (10/12) with My Morning Jacket, Grizzly Bear and a DJ set from James Murphy.

Pics from ACL day 1 are here (and an additional set of Depeche Mode here), and day 2 are here and here. More pics from day 3 below...

Thom Yorke and Nigel Godrich's Atoms for Peace hit Barclays Center last night (9/27), as part of their tour, with all the crescendos and dramatic lighting effects you'd expect. The group -- which also includes Flea on bass, stalwart drummer Joey Waronker and Mauro Refosco on additional percussion -- played a good chunk of both Yorke's Eraser and this year's Atoms for Peace album, Amok, plus his UNKLE track, "Rabbit in the Headlights" and Radiohead b-side, "Paperbag Writer." If you went, what did you think of the show? Pictures of the show are in this post.

James Holden opened the show and he plays againtonight with Four Tet which, if you didn't hear has moved locations. No longer at Williamsburg's Riverfront Studios, the show's is now happening at 251 W 30th St in Manhattan, which is the space that once housed Rebel NYC. Doors are at 10 PM.

UK IDM producer James Holden is over in North America supporting Thom Yorke's band Atoms for Peace on some of their tour dates, and since we last spoke, it's been announced that he will be opening tonight's (9/27) Barclays Center show in Brooklyn. Tickets for tonight's show are still available. All dates are listed below.

Atoms for Peace are in NYC currently, getting ready for their big show at the Barclays Center on Friday (9/27). While here they stopped by The Daily Show last night (9/25). Thom Yorke and Flea talk with Jon Stewart a bit about how a supergroup like this forms and then the band played "Default" and "Harrowdown Hill" (from Thom Yorke's Eraser) over the closing credits. Video of their appearance is in this post.

Atoms for Peace puzzle

In other related news, Atoms for Peace are now selling a jigsaw puzzle, via their website, of an illustration (above) by Stanley Donwood who does their artwork as well. The 192-piece laser-cut wood puzzle, titled "Los Angeles," shows the titular city facing apocalyptic events and is pretty small - 360mm X 250mm (a little bigger than a legal pad). It's not cheap ($106) but you can buy it here.

Atoms for Peace's Amok came out back in February. Tickets are still available for their Barclays show. Videos from The Daily Showbelow...

Atoms for Peace's Thom Yorke and Nigel Godrich fielded questions from teenage girls about dating and love in the new installment of Rookie Magazine's "Ask a Grown Man" video series. Their answers are pretty honest and insightful and you can watch them give that advice below.

Though Guns N Roses being announced as the third headliner and related "YOLO" Facebook messages were the most discussed and controversial topics when one of NYC festival Governors Ball's promoters hopped in a Reddit chat yesterday (4/3), we also learned that: Miguel dropped off the festival; the promoters were trying to land Atoms for Peace (whose tour instead brings them to NYC for a Barclays Center show on 9/27); Cut Copy and Kendrick Lamar are playing at the same time on the Saturday of the fest, and there are unannounced afterparties. "Stay tuned for epic shows at Brooklyn Bowl, MHOW, Gramercy, Glasslands, and Irving Plaza." That quote and more over at Reddit.

Governors Ball goes down on Randall's Island from June 7 - 9 and also includes a number of other artists like Kanye West, Nas, Grizzly Bear, The xx, Feist, Beach House, Animal Collective, Erykah Badu, Death from Above 1979, Crystal Castles, Best Coast, Dirty Projectors, DInosaur Jr., Japandroids, Alt-J, Deerhunter, Fucked Up, and many more. 3-Day passes are still available and tickets for individual days are now on Friday (4/5) at 11 AM.

We recently gave you a list of artists we're excited to see at the festival, and though that list already included Deerhunter, we're even more excited to see them after their recent Fallon performance. If you missed the awesomeness of that (which also included debuting their new single, Monomania), you can watch the video below.

While Thom and Nigel seemed to have fun doing Atoms for Peace as a singing DJ duo last week, they've just announced dates as a band with Flea, Joey Waronker and Mauro Refosco rounding out the line-up. There's a stop in NYC at Barclays Center on September 27. No word on when tickets go on sale just yet but you can keep checking Ticketmaster.

"It's something we've talked about doing for ages, and we finally got our shit together," explains Yorke. "We've basically just cut everything up into its constituent parts. We'll try to re-cut the tunes live, mixing in loads of other bits and pieces and collaging stuff together.

At the same time as manning the machinery, Yorke will be adding his own live vocals and guitar to the mix. "I sing - but I felt kind of weird about that to begin with, because it's quite this weird mixture," he says. "It's like fucking karaoke or something! But it's not, because it's all this other stuff as well, and I have my own machines, like a drum machine and a vocal looper. It's interesting - singing, trying to remember words and programming a drum machine at the same exact time. It's kind of tricky."

Thom Yorke and Nigel Godrich debuted their new Atoms for Peace"singing DJ" configuration at Le Poisson Rouge last night (3/15), celebrating the release of new album Amok. Following sets from Arca and Holly Herndon, Atoms for Peace went on around 1AM and did 12 songs from the new Amok and Thom Yorke's Eraser with those "bonkers" projections. Once their official set ended, the night turned into a dance party with Yorke and Godrich spinning tunes like De La Soul's "A Rollerskating Jam Named 'Saturdays.'" Not bad for a school night.

More pics from Le Poisson Rouge, plus Atoms for Peace's setlist, are below.

Thom Yorke's group Atoms for Peace, who have a DJ gig in NYC coming up, made a video for "Ingenue" off of their new album, Amok. It was directed by Garth Jennings, who did Radiohead's "Lotus Flower" -- plus a zillion other cool videos and Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy -- and you can check it out below.

As mentioned, Thom Yorke and Nigel Godrich of Atoms for Peace took to the internets today to do a Reddit interview, which you can see HERE. When asked if they knew their album leaked, they said "Oh did it? How nice," and when asked a followup question about how they feel about it, they said, "Well.. unsurprised?" Those responses themselves are pretty "unsurprising," considering this is Thom Yorke, whose other band Radiohead has been using album leaks to their advantages for over a decade. (Thom also did a BBC interview today, which is archived HERE.)

Plus, we now know Atoms for Peace were about to let us hear it anyway, because they've just made the entire new album, AMOK, available at their website, http://amok.atomsforpeace.info. The stream comes along with a visualizer, and any site that links to AFP's site gets added to that visualizer (the site's currently down but will probably be back up later today). You can also listen to the album its entirety below...

As you may be aware, Thom Yorke's Atoms for Peace project drops their debut album, Amok, next week (2/26) via XL. Maybe you've already heard it? You can ask Thom how he feels about leaks and file sharing -- as well as less controversial subjects (what toothpaste does he use?) -- when he participates in a reddit Ask Me Anything interview at 17:30 GMT (that's 12:30 EST).

At the same time, Yorke will be interviewed live on BBC 6Music during Steve Lemacq's show. You can tune in here.

Jenny Lewis will also contribute vocals to two previously unheard Postal Service songs -- "Turn Around" and "A Tattered Line of String" -- that will be included on the 10th Anniversary edition of the duo's sole album, Give Up, due out April 9 via Sub Pop. The bonus disc also contains remixes and Iron & Wine's cover of "Such Great Heights." Tracklisting is below.

Tickets for the Presidents of the United States of Americashow at Irving Plaza playing their self titled debut in its entirety, with support from Eternal Summers, go on Live Nation/Music Geeks presale today at 10 AM (anyone know the password?). General sale starts Saturday at 10 AM.

Ben Harper and Charlie Musselwhite are playing Beacon Theatre on May 3. Tickets for that show go on sale today at 10 AM.

As mentioned, Thom Yorke and Nigel Godrich are doing an Atoms for Peace DJ set in NYC on March 14. When we first mentioned the show, the venue was TBA, and we now know it's happening at Le Poisson Rouge.

Thom Yorketweeted that he and Radiohead producer/Atoms for Peace bandmate/Ultraista member Nigel Godrich will be "out and about with two turnables and a microphone" this winter, with dates set in London, Berlin, and NY on March 14. Special guests and venues TBA. The last time Thom and Nigel DJed in NYC, they performed three previously unreleased Atoms for Peace songs with Thom singing live.

Thom recently made a mix for Dazed & Confused Magazine, which included previously unreleased Radiohead, Atoms for Peace, and Thom Yorke material. You can stream that mix and check out the tracklist below. Atoms for Peace's new album, Amok, will be out on February 26 via XL.

Thom Yorke's Atoms for Peace project will release their new album, Amok on February 26 via XL and they just revealed a new song/video clip from that album, "Judge Jury and Executioner." It will be available on iTunes tonight at midnight UK time or available for free if you pre-order the album.

Ultraista (the project of Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich, Walt Mink/Beck drummer Joey Waronker, and singer Laura Bettinson) has announced some January dates with production wizard Prefuse 73. No word yet on an official tour announcement, but the announced shows include on in NYC happening on January 28 at Music Hall of Williamsburg. Tickets for that show go on sale Friday (12/14) at noon. All known dates are listed below.

In other Radiohead-related news, Thom Yorkerecently revealed the details for his upcoming Atoms for Peace album (titled Amok, due out February 25). NME has since reported that their track, "What The Eyeballs Did," which was the b-side to the "Default" single can be downloaded for free at the Atoms for Peace website if you "scroll all the way over to the right and click on the dial of the clock tower."

As we just posted, Sigur Ros are heading out on their biggest, most-ambitious tour of their career next year, including Madison Square Garden on March 25. The tour wraps up on the West Coast in April, with convenient availability during Coachella 2013's two weekends (4/12-14, 4/19-21). Hmmmm.

Who else do you think might be playing this year?

Per Consequence of Sound, two acts have confirmed their slots on the 2013 fest in interviews. They are EDM artists Kill the Noise and Paul Kalkbrenner. For various reasons, CoS also speculates that Atoms For Peace, Local Natives, Passion Pit, Tegan and Sara, and Wu-Tang Clan all might be playing.